Martin Schram: Demand that your lawmakers stop playing 'cliff' games

Washington's Democratic and Republican leaders seem strangely lacking in fright as they are a mere three weeks away from plunging America off the much-feared Fiscal Cliff.

MARTIN SCHRAMScripps Howard News Service

Washington's Democratic and Republican leaders seem strangely lacking in fright as they are a mere three weeks away from plunging America off the much-feared Fiscal Cliff.

And we've finally figured out why. They figure they are merely heading toward a Fiscal Bungee Jump.

They seem to believe that, yes, they'll take the plunge and plummet downward. But then — boing! — some sort of bungee lifeline will spring them upward again. And they will be able to land on their feet, right back where they started. So they can go on with their same old political fun-and-games, yammering about making the same deals they failed to make weeks ago, months ago, even years ago.

Here's what our leaders don't get: They act as though this Washington game-playing is all about them. It isn't. It's about us. Our jobs. It's our financial future they repeatedly jeopardized while playing their power games.

Make no mistake: They know how they stifled job creation, by creating a perpetual uncertainty that caused executives to freeze hiring in big corporations and small businesses, and government agencies at all levels.

This year, as Washington pretended it was promoting job creation during Campaign 2012, it was really perpetuating an uncertainty that grew into epic (and almost panic) proportions. Executives in the private and public sector instituted hiring freezes, uncertain whether they'd have to staff up, cut back or even close down.

Good governance seemed a high-risk roll. So they stuck to name-calling and negative ads.

Then for four weeks following the election, they began what they called "negotiations" but really gave us more of the same-old game-playing.

Put the plans on paper and you see a deal can be reached now before we get to the edge of the cliff — with details to be ironed out next year. But when Washington's politicians get in front of a microphone, all that vanishes.

They start performing as if they are in a World Wrestling Federation tag-team match. One makes a move and the other howls and pounds the mat in feigned pain. Example: When Obama laid out his first details, Boehner, who offered none, wailed that, "We're nowhere." But later Boehner laid out his own details, and the White House called his plan "nothing new." We are waist deep in quicksand.

That's why you must jump into the ring. Right now! Not to perform like another scripted wrestler, but to lead our leaders.

Here's what we need you to do: Contact your senators and representatives — not once but repeatedly. Demand that they quit their game-playing and attack politics comments. Demand they make public their bottom line spending cuts to keep us from plunging off the cliff. Whether your representative is a tea-party Republican or a liberal Democrat, you must now let them know their no-compromises posture is no longer acceptable.

Now patriotism demands that we rise to the occasion. Even when it means we must lower ourselves to the level of our leaders — to get their attention and demand that they quit playing their games.